1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a technology to support creation of a report on medical images.
2. Description of the Related Art
Results of image diagnosis performed by observing medical images by a medical doctor are summarized as an image diagnosis report. In the past, image findings and impression of image diagnosis were written by hand in special writing paper by the medical doctor. In recent years, with implementation of electronic management of medical documents for the purpose of making medical services more efficient, image diagnosis reports are increasingly created electronically. However, many conventional report creation support apparatuses still let the medical doctor input image findings and impression of image diagnosis as free sentences and thus, it takes considerable time for the medical doctor to input free sentences and a significant burden is placed on the medical doctor to create a report.
Previous attempts to address the above problems have been made. Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2007-305107 proposes a report creation support technology that makes use of image search and report sentence templates. Specifically, a report creation support apparatus holds report sentence templates created based on reports about a plurality of case images (created beforehand). When a medical image (hereinafter referred to as a diagnosis target image) of a patient to be diagnosed is input, the report creation support apparatus performs a search of the past case images to determine if past case images similar to the diagnosis target image exist. Then, the report creation support apparatus acquires a report sentence template corresponding to one similar image acquired by the search and displays the template. Then, the medical doctor can reduce time and efforts to create report sentences by correcting the displayed template.
A conventional method for searching similar images is a method by which image characteristics of a plurality of case images accumulated in advance and image characteristics of an image to be diagnosed are compared and some similar images are selected in descending order of similarity between image characteristics. However, it is necessary to appropriately set items (hereinafter referred to as “search parameters”), for example, which image characteristics to compare, how to define the similarity between image characteristics, and the level of similarity (a value of threshold) above which an image is determined to be a similar image.
According to the conventional search method, there is the possibility that a similar image fitting for the user's choice may not be searched for if search parameters are not appropriately set. More specifically, almost no case image which the user finds to be similar may be searched or many case images found by the user not to be similar may be searched. Therefore, it is necessary for the user to set appropriate search parameters to search for a similar image fitting the user's choice.
In general, however, there are many types (several tens of types) of image characteristics and several definition methods of similarity and if the similarity is continuous, the threshold can infinitely be changed. Therefore, the work to search for search parameters providing a similar image fitting the user's choice by trial and error while viewing search results of similar images takes time and effort.
According to the conventional search method, as described above, there is a problem that a similar image fitting for the user's choice may not always be searched.
Further, according to the method discussed by Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2007-305107, even if a plurality of similar images is obtained by the search, only a report sentence template corresponding to one similar image can be used for report creation support of a diagnosis target image. In other words, there is a problem that information obtained from a plurality of reports corresponding to the plurality of similar images cannot be used simultaneously.